This blog is about my experiences with hypothyroidism and to swap notes with other people. I was diagnosed in 2009 and am still not entirely well, though I’m much better now than I was. I set up a thyroid patients' support group in London in 2010 and we continue to meet regularly and welcome new members. There's lots of info on the net aimed at thyroid patients, much of it contradictory and confusing. My aim is to provide a more balanced perspective and information from credible sources.

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Thursday, 3 October 2013

"Thursday, Thursday, Thursday...."

I had a meeting with my GP this morning, also the practice manager and a professional mediator. I found it quite harrowing but I'm hoping good things will come of it. Get me, ever the optimist....

I'm not dead yet!*

The background is that we had a mix up a couple of months back, I won't bore you with the details now, I may follow up with them in a later post. As well as the mix up I was getting fed up that I often find it really difficult to talk to my GP. She often interrupts me and doesn't let me finish what I'm saying and she often appears impatient. It's frustrating.

As a patient with a chronic health condition I need to be able to talk to my doctor. I need to feel she is listening and I need to have confidence I am receiving a good standard of care. When I don't feel listened to I become concerned that any treatment recommendations being made may be ill considered and that important factors may be being overlooked. I am mindful that as an autoimmune hypothyroid patient I will typically have multiple symptoms which may be linked to my thyroxine dose, or something else needing to be addressed - and I am liable to pick up other conditions too. Symptoms can be caused by the thyroid condition and also by other things which may be wrong.

I am fiercely determined to be as well as I can be and to advocate for myself to receive the best possible healthcare. I also feel passionately that many other patients with chronic health conditions also deserve the best of care and may not be in a position to advocate for themselves as strongly as I, with my years of experience as a professional communicator, can. So I am committed to holding medical professionals to account to provide a good standard of care for everyone. Oh and of course, when I am not as well as I am now, my own communication abilities are debilitated and I simply can't be doing with every conversation I have with my doctor being a struggle.

Today's meeting came about following a series of letters exchanged between myself and the practice. Each letter I sent was hard work for me to write and was only done because I felt I had no option. I had kind of reached the end of my tether with them. To their credit the practice have been totally on the ball and responsive with each communication. I have faith in their good intentions. I recognise they work with systemic difficulties which are not their fault. I have faith that my doctor is a good, knowledgeable and committed doctor. But she unfortunately is working under extreme pressure so is constantly having to prioritise and work as swiftly as she can and that means the service she can provide may always be somewhat compromised. In addition, I think that after today the penny has dropped for me that her sometimes unfortunate communication style is nothing to do with me but comes of being someone who is intellectually super bright but doesn't have strong interpersonal skills. I had been worried that her behaviour towards me meant she thought I was a waste of space. I'm reassured after today that I don't think that's the case.

While I would love to have a doctor who is warm and empathetic I feel it is more important that I have one who is efficient and on the ball. Ideally I would naturally like to have both but at the moment, with the NHS in the mess it's in, I fear that might not be possible. I just don't know. Are my expectations too low? Certainly changing doctors, while an option, is no guarantee that I will end up with anything better than I've got now. *sad face*. Actually I'm being unfair, she is genuinely empathetic, she just isn't always great at expressing that empathy.

We had a big chat. I reached the conclusion that she will probably always be quite hard work but that she knows her stuff, medically and that she does have my best interests at heart. We agreed to work at the relationship and hopefully over time it will improve. As this is what both sides want I am hopeful we can make it work.

The mediator and practice manager were both helpful and also seemed committed to achieving the best possible outcome. I made it clear I will change doctors if I decide I need to and she said she hoped I wouldn't, as she'd see it as a professional failure and she cares about providing a good standard of care.

The whole thing was bloody hard work. A bit like life I hear you cry! Well yes, maybe. Maybe that's just how things are. It could certainly have been worse.

The "Thursday Thursday Thursday...." thing is the sticking point. I said - "I need to know you hear what I'm saying, it doesn't work for me when you interrupt me", she said "I need to filter all the different things that patients say to me, identify what's important and respond to that, if you were to sit in front of me and just say Thursday, Thursday, Thursday I wouldn't respond to that because I would know that it wasn't important". Hmmm, if I'm saying something important and she's hearing it as "Thursday, Thursday Thursday", that's no good is it? That's no good at all. And I don't go to the surgery to say things that don't matter, my time is worth more than that.

Do I trust her judgement on what is "Thursday" and what is important? That, for me, is perhaps the crux of the matter. I recognise that she knows a lot more than me about mecicine and she acknowledged that I will know more about my condition than anyone else. She said that she values my input in decision making, which is a good thing. Hmmm. The theory is that after clearing the air today we have built some mutual understanding and she will listen to me more in future, mind you she didn't actually say she would. The "Thursday" comment was possibly quite telling.

After the meeting I felt quite frazzled. My lovely husband gave me a big hug and a bar of chocolate and my Twitter friends rallied round, one tweeted me a beautiful oil painting of a tranquil sea he'd just finished, another took me out for coffee and a flapjack - and brought me home made honey and freshly laid eggs too! People are amazing. I feel supported. I'm grateful for that.

I have some more thinking to do and will post again about next steps, when I've had more chance to reflect on what they're going to be....

How about you, ever complained? Ever switched doctor? Ever wanted to? Ever used the NHS Mediation Service, or posted your experience on Patient Opinion, or pursued any other avenues to make things better between you and your doc? I'd love to know. You can comment below if you'd like to, I'd love it if you did.

*My friend from twitter who kindly took me out for coffee today suggested we meet by the Halloween display in The Range, Westwood Cross, there's actually quite a nice coffee bar there and she had some business to attend to nearby. I thought the gruesome display was hilarious - and kind of apt for today's post - at least I'm not dead yet and I've got lovely friends and I can still have a laugh!